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Seriously 14-15, no. Just because you may be able to conceive easier at a younger age does not mean you should. ..
That poster has a particular viewpoint; we might term it, an agenda... a radically "pronatalist" agenda. It blithely disregards the flourishing of individual humans, in favor of emphasis on a particular (I'll use that euphemism again) communal flourishing. One finds such kinds of beliefs all across the political spectrum... namely, that we should importune or constrain the individual in favor of some "greater good".
I find such "greater good" appeals to be pernicious and baleful. Not only are they unjust, but they purport to have a higher wisdom, a higher understanding of what ought to be... an understanding that mere individuals, benighted as they are, can't possibly have. I say instead, relishing if you like the opposite extreme, that better for humanity to go extinct, than to so bother and cajole us, to radically alter our lives, for the "collective good". Allies (or opponents) to this view can readily be found, by taking one or another of any of the wedge-issues of our time.
Last edited by ohio_peasant; 03-28-2023 at 01:13 PM..
Seriously 14-15, no. Just because you may be able to conceive easier at a younger age does not mean you should. What about all the "the human brain isnt mature until age 25". You really think immature people should be procreating? We are already seeing a problem with young parents abandoning their offspring for someone else to raise, if they dont kill them first.
I tend to agree with your wife.
Yep maybe we need to campaign men to take a more active role in parenting and work on mandated maternity/paternity leave, flexible hours and affordable/available childcare.
Quote:
Originally Posted by ohio_peasant
That poster has a particular viewpoint; we might term it, an agenda... a radically "pronatalist" agenda. It blithely disregards the flourishing of individual humans, in favor of emphasis on a particular (I'll use that euphemism again) communal flourishing. One finds such kinds of beliefs all across the political spectrum... namely, that we should importune or constrain the individual in favor of some "greater good".
I find such "greater good" appeals to be pernicious and baleful. Not only are they unjust, but they purport to have a higher wisdom, a higher understanding of what ought to be... an understanding that mere individuals, benighted as they are, can't possibly have. I say instead, relishing if you like the opposite extreme, that better for humanity to go extinct, than to so bother and cajole us, to radically alter our lives, for the "collective good". Allies (or opponents) to this view can readily be found, by taking one or another of any of the wedge-issues of our time.
Spot on, both of these.
Women do not want to be baby factories, dependent on and subject to the whims of someone else who may turn out to not be Prince Charming. There's a lot of denial and fingers-in-ears "LA-LA-LA-LA-LA" going on about that.
Statements like "I find such "greater good" appeals to be pernicious and baleful" probably need to be qualified within a given context.
We spent many billions to build the Interstate Highway System (IHS) even though we had lots of railroads, even though not all people want to drive, even though highway accidents kill people, etc. But the greater good was served, in major ways. The IHS provided a dramatic productivity boost to moving goods and people and lit a fire under the tourism industry as well as the freight industry, all of which brought down costs and speeded up the movement of goods --- for the greater good. Same for the Polio Vaccine, supporting the Air Traffic Control System to make possible a commercial jet aviation industry, flood control dams, and many more such examples.
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Statements like "I find such "greater good" appeals to be pernicious and baleful" probably need to be qualified within a given context.
We spent many billions to build the Interstate Highway System (IHS) even though we had lots of railroads, even though not all people want to drive, even though highway accidents kill people, etc. But the greater good was served, in major ways. The IHS provided a dramatic productivity boost to moving goods and people and lit a fire under the tourism industry as well as the freight industry, all of which brought down costs and speeded up the movement of goods --- for the greater good. Same for the Polio Vaccine, supporting the Air Traffic Control System to make possible a commercial jet aviation industry, flood control dams, and many more such examples.
That's because these matters affect all individuals personally, and not just in amorphous and abstract aggregate. Even if one doesn't drive and doesn't use the highways, the groceries that one buys at the local supermarket are delivered via trucks driven on the highway. And even if one personally doesn't care about polio, refusing the vaccine puts everyone else in direct risk.
Contrast that with moralistic exhortations. Ban alcohol (Prohibition). Ban nude beaches. Or mandate that all women we hijab. The "greater good" isn't about receiving fresh vegetables or relief from threat of polio, but the supposed deleterious effects of drinking beer or seeing exposed skin. The "rationalization" goes, that you yourself, Sir, might be able to handle your liquor... but Bob over there, is flighty and dissolute. So we need to curtail your liberties, to keep Bob in line... for the greater good.
The exhortation for teenage girls to delay their education and instead to become breeders, reminds me of inversion of Hamlet's advice to Ophelia, to get herself to a nunnery. But Hamlet was only mad north-northwest.
We also have the issue of dealing in the present, with something that might only matter in 200 years. It's even more contentious than the parallel matter of climate change, where we're called to curtail our consumption and activities now, for the greater-good in the future. Except that with climate change we already see real and measurable deleterious effects, whereas with declining population we do not, except for maybe in Japan or Russia. In both population decline and climate change, individuals are asked to change their behavior right now, substantially and for the worse... for the "greater good". Odd, isn't it, that often the very same voices that decry climate change as a hoax or at best an exaggeration, are quite vocal about the supposed need to get busy making more babies, not realizing that their call to alter behavior, stems from the very same paternalism?
It gets worse. With climate change, I may have to sweat more, turning off my air conditioner, to save energy. Or drive less, despite those wonderful new highways. My life is worse, but only incrementally worse. I don't like it, but my disliking it, is ultimately minor. With reproduction, we're asking teenage girls to corrupt their lives with premature motherhood, and possibly more motherhood than they would ever want, just so that the next generation of the elderly, could have better benefits. Reminds me of the Taliban. Sickening... just [expletive] sickening!
Women do not want to be baby factories, dependent on and subject to the whims of someone else who may turn out to not be Prince Charming................
Clearly women almost around the world share your sentiment. That's why the birth rate will continue falling. I don't think anyone is going to try to force anyone to have children when they don't want them.
The three things that researchers tell us contribute most to childlessness are (1) urbanization of families as they move toward the cities, (2) emancipation of women as they become more educated and pursue careers and (3) the decline in religion. Look within yourself and see if any of this applies to you.
One place where the numbers refute your analysis is Israel. In Israel the TFR is climbing (3.1) and has for many years. If there is one country where women are fully, completely integrated into society it is Israel. So perhaps your view that women can either be baby factories or have a life, but not both, could use a little work.
... but the overall TFR for the u.s. is 1.69 and it takes a TFR of 2.1 to replace a society. I don't know off the top of my head what percentage points (last 10 years) the decline is ... but I trust you can look into it. (couple years back or last year it was 1.78) ...
Quote:
Originally Posted by Listener2307
Those are the facts. I can't imagine why people insist that because population has not yet declined, it never will. The fact is, it will, and sharply, too.
Immigration may provide some relief for those looking for labor, and may even put off US population decline. I don't know about that because we don't really know how many people are drifting into the country. Whatever the number is, it is one more for the US and one less for someone else, so in a discussion of global population it just washes out.
Mankind did fairly well for some 80,000 years. It was only after progress resulted in a much lower infant mortality rate and a much longer life span that population exploded. Note that women did not suddenly decide to have more babies; the babies they had just started living longer.
We have no way of knowing how steeply the population will decline, but in 1800 there were about 1B people in the entire world. That's only 220 years in the past. I truly expect to see world population fall right through that number, but I have no idea when.
I'm bad at projection math, so much so, I let others report those numbers for me. But if we are at 8 Billion with projected growth of 2 Billion over then next 77 years it doesn't seem like a healthy growth, but a stagnate growth to me, globally.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Listener2307
Mankind did fairly well for some 80,000 years. It was only after progress resulted in a much lower infant mortality rate and a much longer life span that population exploded. Note that women did not suddenly decide to have more babies; the babies they had just started living longer.
It's been said and I think it was in the video you pointed to that there are countries that society it putting into the heads of the aging, that they should kill themselves, rather than become a burden on society. That's just sad.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Listener2307
Those are the facts. I can't imagine why people insist that because population has not yet declined, it never will. The fact is, it will, and sharply, too.
Could be because they are not taking into account migration. During the recession there were more people leaving the u.s. than coming in and the immigration numbers were at a Net 0. Most people were looking at the number of people moving into the u.s. without taking into account how many were leaving or had left already ... with no jobs, they left. People in the u.s. were like, they need to clamp down on immigration. There are two sides in accounting, funny how in some instances people only see the one side.
Any way they say, the first part of solving a problem is recognizing there is one. Not seeing it coming people may get blindsided by the change. The world isn't ending, but it will change and the way people do things will, also change. It's going to be different, that's all. And change is slow.
Clearly women almost around the world share your sentiment. That's why the birth rate will continue falling. I don't think anyone is going to try to force anyone to have children when they don't want them.
The three things that researchers tell us contribute most to childlessness are (1) urbanization of families as they move toward the cities, (2) emancipation of women as they become more educated and pursue careers and (3) the decline in religion. Look within yourself and see if any of this applies to you.
One place where the numbers refute your analysis is Israel. In Israel the TFR is climbing (3.1) and has for many years. If there is one country where women are fully, completely integrated into society it is Israel. So perhaps your view that women can either be baby factories or have a life, but not both, could use a little work.
The issue of Israel gets very complicated because you have increasing percentages of ultra Orthodox Jewish that have very high birth rates, that become a larger contingent over time- influencing more changes at the government level. Here in the US at the state level we have the case of Kiryas Joel, NY and Monroe, NY. There are big problems with the two towns battling it out over zoning as one town has exponential growth rate with 60% of the population under age 18, whereas the other has less than 25% of the population under age 18. The former now has a population density of 20,000 people per square mile in Rockland County, NY.
Last edited by GraniteStater; 03-28-2023 at 08:53 PM..
Clearly women almost around the world share your sentiment. That's why the birth rate will continue falling. I don't think anyone is going to try to force anyone to have children when they don't want them.
The three things that researchers tell us contribute most to childlessness are (1) urbanization of families as they move toward the cities, (2) emancipation of women as they become more educated and pursue careers and (3) the decline in religion. Look within yourself and see if any of this applies to you.
One place where the numbers refute your analysis is Israel. In Israel the TFR is climbing (3.1) and has for many years. If there is one country where women are fully, completely integrated into society it is Israel. So perhaps your view that women can either be baby factories or have a life, but not both, could use a little work.
You don't have to condescend to me, I'm not refuting most of your points.
In my ideal world, it is not all or nothing - women can have children and a life (non-parenting aspects such as career, hobbies, outings with friends, etc). As can men. But our society is not set up that way, it's making it harder and harder to become a parent, especially of multiple children, if you don't make significant sacrifices elsewhere, to the point of living like you're poor or it's the 1800's. And we have posters trying to subtly imply that women should abandon anything that interferes with child-rearing and get back to work making and raising babies. That is what I (and many other women) are saying "no thanks" to.
I'm bad at projection math, so much so, I let others report those numbers for me. But if we are at 8 Billion with projected growth of 2 Billion over then next 77 years it doesn't seem like a healthy growth, but a stagnate growth to me, globally.
And if that's what is experienced, it will be, as you said, fairly stagnate. Unfortunately UN sources are almost the only ones still promoting that figure.
Guardian says, 8.8B by 2050 and then taper off rapidly, and then there are plenty of demographers who have differing time frames and so forth. They all agree that the end of population growth is within sight. It's just a matter of the date it reverses.
China reversed. After years of denying it, they finally "fessed up" and reported a population loss.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ellis Bell
.....................Any way they say, the first part of solving a problem is recognizing there is one. Not seeing it coming people may get blindsided by the change. The world isn't ending, but it will change and the way people do things will, also change. It's going to be different, that's all. And change is slow.
My position - and it's based on attempts in South Korea, Singapore, Sweden and Russia - is that the problem cannot be solved through government action or incentives. I have good company in that opinion. Nicholas Eberstadt, of American Enterprise Institute in his video "The Depopulation Bomb" is of the same view:
Quote:
Well, we've seen the results of the experiments. I will give you my reading on them. My reading is not uncontested because baby bonus programs have got a lot of proponents in Europe and some here in the US already. My reading is that it's very expensive for temporary passing blips in fertility increase, which lead to subsequent slumps. The Swedes have been-- Peter Robinson: You can buy babies forward, so to speak, but you can't buy more of them. Nicholas Eberstadt: Yeah, you can change timing. If some parents are on the fence about a second or a third child, let's say, and all of a sudden there's a baby bribe that's offered to them, they may decide to have the child now, instead of having it three years later or four years later.
It's a video worth seeing where the interviewer gives an honest attempt to understand the subject matter instead of eliciting a response he wants.
The transcript is also available. That works better for some people.
Clearly women almost around the world share your sentiment. That's why the birth rate will continue falling. I don't think anyone is going to try to force anyone to have children when they don't want them.
The three things that researchers tell us contribute most to childlessness are (1) urbanization of families as they move toward the cities, (2) emancipation of women as they become more educated and pursue careers and (3) the decline in religion. Look within yourself and see if any of this applies to you.
One place where the numbers refute your analysis is Israel. In Israel the TFR is climbing (3.1) and has for many years. If there is one country where women are fully, completely integrated into society it is Israel. So perhaps your view that women can either be baby factories or have a life, but not both, could use a little work.
I'm not disputing this but to save me researching myself could you summarize why it is easier for women in Israel to be working mothers than it is so in the US? Or how the climbing birth rate allows women to completely integrated or have a life.
Is it egalitarian marriages, flexible work hours, affordable daycare?
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